Gov’t to rebid 5 prime properties

THE GOVERNMENT plans to rebid at least five pieces of property that it failed to privatize early this year, according to the Privatization and Management Office (PMO).

Newly appointed Chief Privatization Officer Toni Angeli V. Coo said last week that the following properties remained in the pipeline for disposition within the year: the 47,823-square-meter tract of land of Interland Chemicals Inc. in Atimonan, Quezon; the 21,056-square-meter Fil-Eastern Woods Inc. lot along E. Rodriguez Avenue in Quezon City; the 2,798-square-meter former property of National Power Corp. near Makati Medical Center along Sen. Gil Puyat (Buendia) Avenue in Makati City; the 1,956-square-meter Emmanuel Community Hospital property in Tondo, Manila; and the 13,000-square-meter Luzon Aggregates Inc. lot in Parañaque City.

The PMO declared a failed bidding for these five properties during auctions held last March and April due to the lack of bidders.

The Luzon Aggregates property, for which firm Triplex Enterprises Inc. had pitched a “favorable offer” to the PMO, will again be bid out but with a new floor price of P268 million, which Coo noted was “still within the market value.” This Parañaque lot had a P296-million price tag.

“If there would be no more offers for the Luzon Aggregates property, we will be allowed to negotiate to sell it to Triplex,” according to Coo.

The PMO chief said the group had yet to finalize the timetable for the rebidding of the five properties.

Also, Coo said that during last week’s Privatization Council meeting, the inter-agency body approved to award the 25,044-square-meter Repacom property in Marilao, Bulacan to Jose Co and Rodrigo Ko, who jointly submitted a P15.661-million bid to beat two other bidders last March.

Besides the disposition of the Repacom lot, the PMO’s most successful privatization was that of the 74-hectare FTI property in Taguig City in 2012, for which Ayala Land Inc. shelled out P24.3 billion.

The latest Treasury data showed that privatization proceeds last year amounted to P1.946 billion, a little short of the P2-billion annual target of the Aquino administration.